Requiem Aeternum

by Lana Bella

I drove a green-checkered taxicab waiting
for a woman who had not once but twice
left me at the curbside waiting, with red-
lit meter synchronizing to the time watch
on my left wrist, during which the wheels
sprang a stream of obscene language into
darkness, protesting its ease, grumbling.

Let’s pretend that woman wasn’t drunk or
beaten up or dead inside that house, for
hundreds of people have sat and gabbed
and griped about their miserable lives on
my wool seat since. Still, I often drove by
her street, the kind of street where I knew Mozart’s
spinet would soothe the milky heartache
and laconic virtues of the upper class.